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New Liberal ad blames Horwath for potential Tory win

Ontario Finance Minister and Mississauga South Liberal candidate Charles Sousa unveils new ad that targets NDP Leader Andrea Horwath on May 10 2014. Due to an advertising blackout, the ad will appear only on the web until May 21 when it can legally be aired on television. Sousa says he's perplexed why Horwath would force an election over his budget. (Toronto Sun/Antonella Artuso)

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NDP Leader Andrea Horwath’s refusal to support Premier Kathleen Wynne’s budget has created an opportunity for a “smirking” Tim Hudak to form a PC government, Liberal Finance Minister Charles Sousa says.

Sousa unveiled a new party ad Saturday that attacks Horwath, not Hudak, and blames her for rejecting the Liberals’ “positive” budget and forcing a provincial election.

“Andrea Horwath’s decision also raised the prospect of a radical Hudak government in Ontario,” Sousa said. “So the question is, ‘Is Andrea Horwath for real?’”

A media blackout means the Liberals cannot run their ad on television until May 21, but there is no law in place to bar them from putting it on the web or showing it to media.

Campaigning in Brampton Saturday, Horwath said Ontarians know the NDP has worked hard to listen to them and to bring their concerns to Queen’s Park over the past few years.

“What I think is not real is a budget that promises 70 new plans, new initiatives when the government couldn’t even get three basic ones done from last year,” she said, referring to NDP demands for more seniors’ home care, lower auto insurance rates and the creation of a financial accountability office.

Although polls suggest that Hudak is Wynne’s main opponent, the ad appears to be targeted at NDP supporters who may be willing to vote Liberal strategically to keep a Progressive Conservative out of the premier’s office.

“The adversary is, in fact, both. And they’re adversarial to the well-being of the province,” Sousa said, when asked why the ad goes after Horwath instead of Hudak.

Horwath told reporters earlier that she could no longer trust the Liberals or vote for one of their budgets in part because of the $1.1 billion gas plants scandal and OPP allegations that public records were destroyed in the office of the premier.

Sousa did not respond directly to a question on whether it was appropriate to call an election over the cancelled gas plants, one of which was to have been built in his riding of Mississauga South.

Hudak was in Courtice, near Oshawa, Saturday where he promised a 30% cut in business taxes — bringing the corporate tax rate to 8% from the current 11.5% and making it the lowest in North America.

Hudak said he would pay for his campaign commitment by ending direct government grants or loans to businesses which he calculated costs Ontario about $2 billion to $3 billion a year.

Wynne has a plan to partner with businesses that create jobs, but Hudak said he doesn’t believe that government should reward one company over another.

“The only thing worse than big government is when big government gets into bed with big business,” he said.

Hudak said his business tax cut, a plank in his “Million Jobs Plan,” would create 120,000 private sector jobs in the province.

The PCs have also vowed to balance the province’s provincial books by 2016, which Hudak says would require the elimination of 100,000 public sector positions over the next few years.

“I don’t know if Mr. Hudak’s actually ever looked in the face and the eyes of someone being fired. I don’t know if he’s ever had the courage to stand up to someone and say to them ... ‘I know you have a family, I know you have kids, you know what, you’re not going to be working anymore. I’ve got to balance the books one year earlier,’” Sousa said.

Hudak said the government has added 300,000 people to the public payroll since 2003.

Meanwhile, private sector workers — such as the 280 people at the Brampton Unilever plant — have lost jobs by the tens of thousands because their companies have decamped to more business-friendly jurisdictions, he said.

Horwath said the Liberals have already cut corporate taxes and it hasn’t helped create jobs.

An NDP government would bring in business tax credits for companies that took on new hires.